$Unique_ID{BAS00025}
$Title{Lives of the Players:  Introduction}
$Author{
Holway, John B.
Carroll, Bob}
$Subject{Lives Players Introduction}
$Log{}

Total Baseball:  The Players


Lives of the Players:  Introduction

John B. Holway and Bob Carroll


     In the following pages you'll find biographical sketches of 400 men, all
in one way or another connected to baseball. Two questions naturally arise.
First, why 400? And second, why these 400?
     To deal with the easier question first, we were limited by space. If we
were going to say anything worthwhile, we had to forget about doing
13,000-plus baseballers and concentrate our attention somewhere in the 350-500
range. We also knew that we would include a number of men for reasons other
than how well they played. For example, Earl Weaver never made the majors as
a second baseman and Judge Landis played a punk shortstop, but we knew they
belonged on our list. When we counted up the "nonplayers," we had about
fifty-five. A couple were waffley: was Clark Griffith a pitcher, a manager,
or an executive?
     Why not 396 or 413? Look, we had to draw a line somewhere. If we drew
it at 407, we'd have no earthly reason for excluding player 408.
     Once we settled on 400 total, we were ready for the hard part. Who?
     We had to have the 215 members of the Hall of Fame. Most of them would
have been included under any reasonable criteria anyway. The few arguable
enshrinees belong in our 400 just because they are enshrinees, sort of a
self-fulfilling immortality.
     A few individuals not yet in the Hall of Fame made the cut as managers or
contributors. We were ruthless here and probably a little hard on managers.
Well, they're used to rejection.
     Four other factors weighed heavily in our choices of players.
     We wanted a strong sampling of players from all nine positions--nine and
a half counting DH's. Pitching may be 75 percent of baseball, as Connie Mack
used to say, but we weren't about to present 300 pitchers and 100 position
players. Neither did we want 112 slugging left fielders and 8 catchers. We
decided that we'd include roughly 30 players at each position. Those who will
say they can name a dozen shortstops more valuable than our last couple of
second basemen may be right; they'll also be irrelevant. We ended up being
hoisted a little by our own petard; we kept grieving over terrific pitchers
we'd left out, but we already had included over 100 hurlers.
     Obviously we had to consider quality. Everyone has an opinion, but most
of us could agree on the greatest-of-the-great--maybe even on the great. It
was the "darned good's" that gave us trouble. Example: no one would leave
out Ted Williams and few would skip Billy Williams. But what about Cy, Dick,
Earl, or Ken?
     Pete Palmer, Bill James, and a few others have done a lot of valuable
work using statistical analysis in ranking players from different eras of
baseball history. We used their various rankings as a starting point, but we
couldn't follow them slavishly. They do not always agree in their rankings.
Furthermore, many nineteenth-century players and the great black players of
the pre-Jackie Robinson days are not subject to the same statistical analysis.
And finally there are players we felt we must include for reasons other than
pure competency.
     Which brings us to our third consideration--fame. Quite often, as we
made our final cuts, we were faced with two or three or more players who
seemed virtually interchangeable. When we could find no statistical reason to
include one and not the others, we made a judgment as to which player was the
best known to a modern reader. If our estimate was correct, we included the
one you would most like to read about.
     Two large groups of players were helped by our including fame in our
calculations: nineteenth-century players and players from the Negro Leagues.
Both groups are at a disadvantage in that their statistical records are
incomplete and those that exist do not always relate well to modern major
league baseball's numbers. Was a 30-game winner in 1880 the equivalent of a
15-game winner today? What does a .350 batting average in the Negro National
League of 1935 really mean? We must depend on contemporary accounts to rank
these players. Of course, those accounts are highly subjective. We know
we'll be hearing, "How can you leave out so-and-so and include whoozis?"
     Our fourth and final consideration applied to only a few players. These
were borderline candidates. They could have been in or out. If one player
had a more interesting story than another of apparently equal worthiness, we
told the more entertaining tale.
     We have to say something about why a few men were not included. Fame was
a consideration but not when all other factors said no. Smead Jolley was
famous but overrated as a hitter, and in the field he was unsafe at any speed.
Jose Canseco is famous, but he needs a few more years of excellent play to be
included. All of the Black Sox were notorious; we included Eddie Cicotte and
Joe Jackson, with some misgivings, because their records prior to their shame
were too good to ignore.
     We passed on players who had supreme moments of accomplishment but failed
to measure up over the long haul. Johnny Vander Meer and Bobby Thomson came
awfully close anyway. Bobo Holloman and Pat Seerey didn't.
     We did not use any absolute statistical cutoffs. Dave Kingman hit 442
home runs, Riggs Stephenson hit .336, and Tony Mullane won 285 games. We
thought some other players were better.
     In preparing the biographical sketches, we wanted to show first of all
why we included each man in our 400. Much of this involves repeating numbers.
For the most part, we tried to rely on traditional categories that nearly
everyone understands: batting average, ERA, RBIs, strikeouts, etc. There are
often more meaningful statistics, pioneered by Palmer, James, and others, but
this does not seem like the proper forum to explain them. We refer you to the
Introduction to the statistical portion of this book.
     We tried to avoid speculation of the if-he-hadn't-been-struck-by-
lightning-he-would-have-hit-a-hundred-homers kind. We don't pretend to know
what might have happened if there'd been no war, if the fences had been moved
in, if Herb Score had ducked, if Cap Anson had played for the 1927 Yankees. We
have our hands full with what did happen; let others worry about might have
been.
     The notorious "park factor" is part of this. By now, everyone must know
that it's easier to hit in Wrigley Field than in the Astrodome--and on and on.
We mentioned park factors in a few sketches when it seemed unavoidable, but to
harp on it for every player affected would have put us all to sleep.
     A few purists may find a note of levity in some of the sketches. Does
that mean we do not view the annual pennant struggles as being on a par with,
say, the struggle for world peace? Golly, we hope so. We can certainly be
accused of enjoying our subjects. When baseball isn't fun anymore, we're all
going to be in trouble.